Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Of Pandemonium,Pain,Panenka and Pipita

Posted by Shibarjun Ghosh, India

Some moments are special. Special enough to write about them even if it is 4 in the morning and you have work to attend to early next day. Jornada 32: Real Madrid Vs Getafe was surely one such match. “Game of Three Thirds” as Terry Gibson stated. It certainly was one... Like Marc Anthony’s rendition in the motion picture “The Mask of Zorro” …

”heroes rise, heroes fall and they rise again with it all…”

The game tonight followed a somewhat similar note.Just as an autobiographical synopsis of any great legend.

1.The Rise(min 0 to min 9)-The first of the three thirds.The shortest of the three. Spanned for little more than 9 minutes. Real Madrid pushed along the wings through Higuain and van der Vaart. The crowd was on a high and the audience experienced some crisp passing, attaking football. Surging runs, floating crosses and tiki taka at its best The party came to a grinding halt when old cantera boys Granero and Soldado combined to silence the bernabeu crowd. Against the run of play Granero collected a pass on the right wing and crossed it to Soldado who suddenly found himself in free space enough to build a parking lot, made no mistake and headed it past a hapless Iker Casillas. Certainly making amends for the miss he has had barely 6 minutes ago and making a statement to the sporting director for a year that he wasted in oblivion.

2.The Fall(min10 to min84)- Ceratinly not as beautiful as the American “Fall” if u are a madrisimo. The 74mins were long. The only silver lining was the Higuain’s goal in the injury time of the first half. The attacking front seemed to have been cut off from the rest of the squad. There was very little activity around Getafe’s goal. An out of touch Huntelaar, an out of position van der Vaart, a confused Guti and an invisible Raul seemed late for the prom night. Lass’s presence was deeply felt as Guti and Gago failed to provide a productive midfield pairing. The modest Getafe was taking the game to their more illustrious neighbours. Playing matadors in the bernabeu is not something that many clubs can afford to do ,but Getafe surely had come to spoil the party. Attacking along the flanks, they nipped any attack that came their way in the bud. Marcelo and Cannavaro seemed wanting against the darting runs of Granero and Gavilan .

Then came the Arjen Robben cameo,who by Juande Ramos’s own admission “has had a problem or two when he plays back to back matches”. 17 minutes, four long “Forrest Gump” runs later the “man of glass” was out. Canna followed shortly after and in came Drenthe and Javi Garcia and a slew of tactical blunders. Gago as centre half and Drenthe on the wings seemed to do precious little in their positions. Uche and Albin then did what seemed at the moment to be hammering in the final nail in the coffin of real madrid’s title ambitions. On a wild run on a counter attack Uche crossed on to Casquero whose header found Albin ,and the hit man from Uruguy did what he had already done twice in the season i.e fire the ball past Iker Casillas . Victor Munoz’s super sub had thrown the spanner to real madrid’s title ambitions and there was silence in the crowd and the only sound was that of crashing dreams. That was min 84.

“Picture abhi baki hain mere dost…(the film has not ended yet my friend…)” as the Bollywood thespians like to put it.

3.The Rise Again (min 85 to min 93)- He has attitude problem, he is any coaches’s nightmare, he is the bad boy of the media, he is past his prime, he is the prodigal son of the Bernabeu, he throws tantrums, make fiery comments and he score stunners from freekick when his team needs it the most…He is JOSE MARIA GUTI.

Min 86- Guti curled the ball from the edge of the box into the top left corner of Stojkovic’s goal. Two minutes is all it took to bring Madrid into the game. The silence of dejection suddenly changed to roars of jubiliation. “Stuff of genius”, “sheer brilliance”, “scintillating” .. the commentators can go on…but for us Madrisimos its was an important equalizer from one of our favourite sons and there was little time to waste on platitudes at this juncture of the game (and the league).Compliments can wait...we have a league to win.

Min 88- Pepe pushed Casquero in the box and then mistook him for the ball which made Pepe see red.(pun intended).

Min 89-Casquero took the kick himself with one eye on the morning newspaper headlines reading out his name in bold letters applauding him as Getafe’s hero who made a fool of the world’s best goalkeeper to give his team a most unlikely victory. The other eye on the ball and the goal seemed not enough. He took a penalty kick which would certainly put him on the tabloids but most probably in the “jokes” section. A weak spot kick which even a ten year old could stop was certainly not good enough to test San Iker.

Still score was 2-2. Time was ticking on.

Min (90+3)- Breaking in through the crowd Gonzalo Higuain shoots and it’s a GOOOAL. A thunderous left footer from the edge of the box went roaring into the top left corner of the Getafe goal. Jubilation turned to delirium and it blew the lid of the Bernabeu .

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Raul Gonzalez is the all time top scorer in Champions League history with 61 goals in 117 games.

Francisco Gento is the only player to be a part of six Champions League winning teams.

Alfredo di Stefano is the all time topscorer with 307 goals in 396 games.

Center back Manuel Sanchis Hontiyuelo who played between 1983 and 2001 has the most number(710) of club appearances.

With a total of 57 trophies Real Madrid are the most successful club in Spain. They have won a record 31 La Liga titles, a record nine UEFA Champions League titles, a record three Intercontinental Cups, a record eight SuperCopa de Espana titles, 17 Copa del Rey titles, one Copa de la Liga, two UEFA Cups and one UEFA Super Cup.

Along with arch rivals Barcelona, Real Madrid shares the record of most number (6) of Ballon d’Or winners for a Spanish club.

In 1986 Real Madrid became the first club to win back to back UEFA Cup titles.

Real Madrid is one of five (Liverpool, AC Milan, Bayern Munich and Ajax are the other clubs) clubs to be honoured with the UEFA Badge of Honour.

In 1966 Real Madrid became the first club ever to win the trophy with players from the same (Spain) country.

Real along with the Barcelona and Athletic Bilbao share the record of never being relegated from the La Liga.

Real Madrid have also won the Copa del Rey four times(1905-08) in a row thus becoming one of three clubs (Barcelona and Athletico Bilbao are the other two) to keep the trophy permanently.

Real Madrid have won the La Liga title five times in a row twice (1960-65, 1985-90).

Real Madrid C.F. (Club De Futbol) was founded as Madrid Football Club in 1902. It was renamed as Real Madrid in 1920 when King Alfonso XIII granted them the title of Royal (Real)